Scott Kirby, CEO of United Airlines, speaks during the WSJ's Future of Everything (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)Getty ImagesIn an era of relentless technological disruption, global competition, supply chain shocks, and fierce battles for talent, many companies pour enormous effort into sophisticated strategies and ambitious initiatives. Yet results often disappoint. Harvard Business School professor Felix Oberholzer -Gee poses a pointed question in his insightful book Better, Simpler Strategy: A Value-Based Guide to Exceptional Performance: How can it be that so many organizations, staffed with talented and highly engaged employees, have so little to show for their hard work.Better Simpler Strategy, a book by Harvard Business School Professor Felix Oberholzer-GeeHBRPThe numbers underscore the puzzle. As Professor Oberholzer points out, roughly one-fourth of S&P 500 firms fail to earn long-term returns above their cost of capital; in China, the share approaches one-third. Even among blue-chip companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, around half deliver 10-year total shareholder returns below the S&P 500 average. The Case Of The AirlinesRecent airline industry performance illustrates the pattern vividly. Over the past decade, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines achieved modestly positive total shareholder returns of around +50%, while American Airlines, Alaska Air Group, and JetBlue posted steep declines ranging from -50% to -70% or worse. Competent teams worked intensely across all these carriers, yet outcomes diverged sharply.Complexity Is The CulpritOberholzer-Gee’s diagnosis is refreshingly straightforward: the culprit is complexity. As firms launch overlapping digital, global, marketing, innovation, and talent initiatives, they lose sight of the forest for the trees. A proliferation of frameworks—often inconsistent—leaves managers without clear guideposts. The result is strategic overload rather than focused execution.MORE FOR YOUThe solution, he argues, lies in radically simplifying strategy through a value-based lens. The core intuition is elegant: companies that achieve enduring financial success create substantial value for customers, employees, or suppliers—and do so consistently. This approach does not require discarding sophisticated tools; it provides a unifying principle to evaluate and prioritize them.The Value-Stick Tool At the heart of Oberholzer-Gee’s framework is the Value Stick, a simple visual tool grounded in economic fundamentals. On one end sits the customer’s willingness to pay (WTP)—the maximum price a buyer would pay for a product or service. On the other end is willingness to sell (WTS)—the minimum compensation employees or suppliers require to provide their labor or goods. The length of the stick represents the total value created by the firm. Profits emerge from capturing a portion of that value after setting prices and managing costs.Extraordinary performance stems from just two levers: raising customer WTP or lowering employee and supplier WTS. Initiatives that fail to move either lever add little lasting advantage and often waste resources.Raising Willingness To Pay Raising willingness to pay demands looking beyond features to the entire customer journey. Managers should seek opportunities to increase delight through superior utility, emotional pleasure, status, joy, or even social impact. This customer-centric mindset differs sharply from a narrow sales focus. It encourages attracting “near customers” who sit just beyond current price tolerance, identifying complementary “helpers” that enhance the offering, distinguishing true competitive friends from foes, spotting market tipping points, and crafting smart strategies for underdogs. By systematically boosting WTP, firms not only command higher prices but also serve more loyal, high-value customers.Lowering Willingness To SellMeanwhile lowering willingness to sell shifts attention to talent and suppliers. Simply raising pay redistributes value without creating it; more generous compensation shifts dollars from the company to employees but does not expand the overall pie. In contrast, improving working conditions, fostering a culture where people feel heard, and making jobs genuinely more attractive can create real value while reducing the compensation needed to attract and retain top talent. Supply chains are “people, too”—making it easier and more rewarding for suppliers to do business lowers their WTS, benefiting the entire ecosystem.The Multiple Aspects Of Value Creation Value-based strategy also illuminates productivity choices. Sometimes “big can be beautiful” when scale enhances value creation, but the real edge often comes from continuous learning and smart implementation. Leaders must ask the practical “how” questions: How exactly will this initiative raise WTP or lower WTS? They should avoid pursuing good outcomes through bad means and focus on connecting disparate activities into a coherent whole.Ultimately, the approach helps companies see relationships across functions—how a digital strategy supports or undermines global ambitions, or whether talent initiatives align with market positioning. It encourages trade-offs and focus rather than trying to excel at everything.Value For Society Oberholzer-Gee emphasizes that value creation for society can and should be part of the equation. When firms deepen competitive advantage by genuinely improving lives for customers, employees, and partners, broader benefits often follow.In a world drowning in multiple frameworks and strategic complexity, Better, Simpler Strategy offers a powerful antidote. By training the organizational lens on net value created—rather than on activity volume or isolated metrics—leaders gain clarity, alignment, and a measurable path to exceptional performance. The airlines that have navigated the past decade more successfully did not necessarily work harder; they created more differentiated value for their most important stakeholders.Relief From Initiative Fatigue and Low Returns For executives weary of initiative fatigue and disappointing returns, the message is liberating: less can indeed be more—when that “less” is relentlessly focused on expanding value for all. In strategy, as in so many domains, simplicity paired with rigor often proves the competitive edge.